Bird Feeding

Since the demise of our old plum tree, we have had nowhere convenient to hang our largest seed feeder. At 4 feet long and taking 16 pints of seed to fill, it needs a strong branch to hold it. So OH has put this feeder stand together, mostly from materials we already had laying around. It seems to do the trick, and has the advantage it can be moved from time to time to avoid a build up of husks underneath. It is also easy to take apart if we want it out of the way in summer. OH has now decided to get another couple of hangers for it so it can hold more feeders.

We usually see a sparrowhawk or two around the feeders each year and lose the odd slow bird, but we delight in seeing these beautiful hunters doing what nature intended. When hunting, their speed and acrobatics are almost too fast to follow.

This year we have seen two sparrowhawks hunting in the garden, a juvenile female, who does not appear very successful, and a beautiful adult male who is a very good hunter indeed! He seems able to take birds at will from the feeders, visiting a couple of times each day and rarely missing. It seemed every time we looked out of the kitchen window we would see him flash past over the hedge from the field, grab a bird from the feeders, usually a goldfinch, and vanish. We had flock of about ten goldfinches around the feeders but we are now left with only a single, rather nervous, individual - the rest have all been eaten. At Oak Tree Cottage we do not usually like to interfere with nature, but in this case the positioning of the hedge and tree makes life very easy for the sparrowhawk - he can gather speed low over the field, skim over the top of the hedge and he is in the middle of the feeders.

So we decided to give the birds on the feeders more of a sporting chance by slightly spoiling his clear run. We have put a row of bamboo canes on top of the hedge and hung a twine obstruction to the side of the hedge, so he will now have to slow slightly to go between the canes or rise higher to go over them, both of which should give the birds on the feeders a split-second longer to react.

He has flashed past the feeders three or four times this afternoon since we spoiled his run-up and that extra split-second seems to have made all the difference, as so far we haven't seen him secure a meal from the feeders; a slow or weak bird would surely have been taken though. No doubt such a mature and experienced bird will quickly work out a new hunting approach, it will be interesting to see.

He perched on the tree once and we managed to take a quick snap of him.